By the end of practice, Nuggets players had pretty much all assumed the “fatigued” pose: hands on knees, pulling at their gym shorts.

It was the kind of result new Nuggets coach Brian Shaw thought he’d see as he put the team through its first practice of training camp on Tuesday afternoon.

“The first practice was informative,” Shaw said. “We had to introduce a lot of new concepts, a lot of terminology that we want the guys to pick up on. They were attentive for that. But a typical first practice, guys got a little tired at the end and it got a little sloppy. But, overall I was happy with what we were able to accomplish.”

According to Shaw, there were big chunks of practice when the players were just standing and listening while he and the assistants implemented the beginnings of his defensive system. And make no mistake, the early part of this camp will be all about defense.

But ultimately there was a large “get to know you” quotient on the Nuggets practice court. Until the end, players were still learning what drills they were running and when.

“I think just getting them accustomed to what I’m looking for and the pace and the speed with which I want them to do it,” Shaw said. “Just getting a rhythm. The players need to get a rhythm with each other, with the groups they are playing with, learning one another. And our coaching staff has to get a rhythm as well, so that we can flow from drill to drill seamlessly.”

Because of the newness of it all, it was difficult for players such as point guard Ty Lawson to draw conclusions about the differences between practices under former coach George Karl, and this one under Shaw.

“The first day was cool,” Lawson said. “It was more instructional than actually playing. It was probably a little bit more structure (than last year). And we were doing half-court stuff; we weren’t running full court too much. It was just the first day, you really can’t tell too many differences. We were just doing the fundamentals.”

Asked if the conditioning time his players put in during the summer in getting themselves ready for season was evident on the court, Shaw chuckled.

“Well, a lot of the work they did in the summertime wasn’t basketball work,” he said. “So there was a different kind of conditioning when it comes to actually getting on the floor and running up and down with a basketball in your hands. It was not like I would like it to, but it was to be expected.”